The Seldom Seen
AN:I... Have no idea how this idea went so weird. It made more sense in my head. OH WELL! Still technically a birthday update for Lithi even though it's past midnight. This is pretty random, but not as far out there as the previous two. XD
34:Boogieman
Seras Victoria sat at Sir Integra Fairbrook Wingates Hellsing's bedside, a faintly concerned look on her eternally youthful face. Her Master had been gone for twenty years on this day, and the Lady Hellsing was laid up with a nasty cold. The Draculina worried that the remaining FREAKS might try to attack – not that she had any doubts to her ability to handle it, but that the stress might make the woman take a turn for the worse.
"Did I ever tell you…" Integra wheezed a bit, her lungs not what they used to be with her years of chain smoking, the sickness not helping, "About how I met your Master?" She asked, a nostalgic look upon her – only slightly – wrinkled face. (Really, it was just the corners of her eyes and the slightly deeper line around her mouth. Seras blamed the stress.)
Seras nodded. "Once or twice." She admitted easily, blonde hair sliding into her cherry red eyes.
"Mmm…" Integra hummed, her eyes unfocused and glassy. "I had nightmares for a month straight until they stopped." Seras made an encouraging noise for the woman to continue, fascinated.
"It was…"
A cliché dark and stormy night, not that Integra was scared of the dark. What reason had she to be frightened of it? No, it was the things inside the dark that made shivers creep down her spine. She shifted uncomfortably in her bed, feeling the urge to draw her knees to her chest to prevent some unseen goblin from biting her toes off.
'This is stupid.' She scolded herself, glasses reflecting the sudden flash of a lightning strike illuminating her room. Shadows danced and she tugged the blankets higher up her chest. 'Just go to sleep, get it over with. You have lessons in the morning.'
The young girl sighed, and placed the oval spectacles on her bedside table, slumping into her pillows and attempting to force herself to sleep.
She woke two hours later, screaming. The scream was muffled by the clap of thunder, which she was thankful for. The last thing she needed was Walter bursting into her room, ready to assault some unknown assailant. Her nightmare was the same every night, Walter ignoring her pleas that she didn't want to be alone with her Uncle, that he was acting strange, leaving her there while he underwent one last mission in her departed father's name. She had taken refuge in the air ducts shortly after, sleeping in them and sneaking food from the kitchens only when she knew no one was around. This continued for a handful of days until she heard of mention of them from one of the men hired to find her. She had no choice but to seek protection elsewhere, remembering her father's last words. "Integra. If it should ever come to it, if the situation is critical. If you've ever been cornered by the enemy and there's nothing else you can do… go to the long forgotten jail in the basement. One of the legacies of our Hellsing family is there. A means for your protection."
When she got there, it was empty. She felt as though something were desperately wrong, but had no time to turn around and try a different door, for her Uncle was there, grinning at her sickly as he raised his gun.
"Hellsing is mine!" He shouted, and her world exploded in fire.
Walter had left her. Alucard wasn't there. She died each night in her dreams.
She stiffened as she felt an unholy presence ooze into her room, jerking her head up to stare into burning crimson eyes. To her credit she did not flinch.
"Frightened of the boogieman, my Master?" He crooned in that deep voice of his, amused. She glared at him with icy blues, clenching her hands into fists. "Don't be ridiculous, vampire!" She snapped.
"Spunky." He leered at her, before bowing with a dramatic flair. "As you say, my Master."
Strangely, she felt safer with her pet monster in her room. She sighed and lifted herself in the bed to rest her back against the headboard. "What do you want?" She asked in a 'grown up' sort of voice.
He chuckled softly under his breath, and extended his hand as if to touch her. She inched back, though no fear showed in her gaze.
His smirk softened the slightest tinge, but was replaced by what she had come to associate with his usual maniacism. "I could taste your fear from the basement, my Master." He informed her, gazing at her intently. He inhaled and sighed appreciatively.
Integra glared at him, "If you're only here to mock me then get out!" She snapped, flinging her hand towards the door. She was in no mood to deal with him for a power struggle.
The Hellsing's tamed vampire grinned at her before bowing and melting away, "As you wish, my Master. Pleasant dreams."
When she fell back into her uneasy dreams they had changed. A shapeless creature with her uncle's cold eyes chased her down a hallway. When she reached the end, she turned to face the shadow, when Alucard stepped out of nowhere to stand between her and the menacing figure.
"So, you're Integra's boogieman?" He sneered, and the girl watched with wide eyes as he stepped up to the creature. Her pet vampire tore a section off of the thing, and shadow blood oozed onto the stone floor, a sour smell of old sweat filled the air. The thing screamed, and the not-sound made her skull throb.
Their eyes met for a moment, and the scream became a single word in her uncle's voice. 'Frauline.'
Alucard picked the boogieman up and his jaw opened to inhuman proportions as he shoved the mass of shadow down his greedy throat.
When Integra woke again it was dawn, and no fear sweat dampened her skin. She felt oddly relieved.
"I never got him to tell me if he did something to me that night, but ever after I've yet to have a nightmare that I can remember."
Seras raised a hand to the woman's forehead and found it burning hot. Christ! She was running a high fever. She wasn't sure how much of that was truth or a fever addled hallucination.
She made some sort of agreeable noise and hopped to her feet to get a damp washcloth to dab at the woman's brow. If her temperature didn't go down by morning Seras would escort her to the hospital personally.
The thought of her Master, Alucard, eating the boogieman tickled her pink, and she liked to think that it was true in a way. He was a monster, everyone knew that, but even monsters had their nice sides at times.